The present invention relates to grilling accessories and, more particularly, to a metal basket that fits inside of kamado grills for removing charcoal.
Kamado Grills claim a legacy going back thousands of years. Typically, these are grills/smokers that are made of ceramic shells, but may also be made from metal or a variety of stone like materials. This gives these charcoal grills excellent insulation, high efficiency, and the ability to hold very high and very low temperatures making them perfect for grilling and smoking.
Kamado grills, however, have limited access to leftover ash through an opening at the bottom. Although specific designs vary, all kamado grills have a bottom plate that is perforated in order to allow ash to drop into a bottom chamber. Ash is required to be forced through these holes into the bottom chamber and then pulled through the opening for disposal. With charcoal remaining in the grill, it is necessary to move the charcoal around so that the ash can fall through the holes, separating the small charcoal and ash from the larger charcoal. This is a lengthy and tedious process.
After multiple grilling/uses, the ash, along with small chunks of charcoal, will clog the holes and collect around the perimeter of the grill, making the grilling and cleaning process more difficult. As a result, it is necessary to remove the larger charcoal from the top of the grill in order to get to the ash and small pieces of charcoal that need to be removed. Then, the user needs to either shovel out the charcoal or push it around until the ash falls through the holes. Shoveling out the charcoal does not separate the good (larger) charcoal from the ash and small pieces. This results in wasted charcoal. Pushing around the charcoal in the grill takes a very long time and does not effectively remove the ashes as many of the smaller pieces that clog the holes just get pushed into other holes. Clogged holes result in poor air circulation from the bottom of the grill, which is necessary based upon the design of kamado grills.
As can be seen, there is a need for an apparatus to easily separate ash from the usable charcoal in kamado grills.